Anyone get Born Yesterday?

Picked some up at New Seasons on Hawthorne (PDX) last night

 

$7.99 is definitely not a normal price. Probably a Total Wine loss leader.

 

Agreed, but the choice of this particular beer for a loss leader is either brilliant or a waste of promo dollars, I can't decide which. Are they specifically targeting the fresh hop beer geek to lure them away from smaller bottle shops, or just picked a Lagunitas seasonal beer at random?

 

I think it's wise to pick BY for this loss. It's delicious stuff & encourages stock movement on the built-in wave of freshness. Most of us were quick to accept the $11ish grocery price. TW is wise to undercut it, as almost anyone would be giddy to buy more @ $7.99. Felt that way when I picked up Topcutter in Vancouver for the same price.

The recipe reminds me of 10 Barrel's Vernside, Oakshire's Centurion, & pFriem's Equinox; so light on the malt bill that it will turn into a tangy pilsner with degradation...better than a malt turd. The growler of Centurion I got did so, Day 2 of enjoyment. The others were a gallon's worth & were drunk so fast as to not lose the freshie effect...especially at the $10 & $13 prices, respectively.

 

Picked up a 6-pack yesterday at Chuck's, had my first one last night. Outstanding. In fact I just decided to do a blind side-by-side with Cowiche today during the game, for science.

 

Fresh (born 9/30/15) beat Born Yesterday (borned 10/26/15), just now. Softer, more nuance, better finish. I'll keep a BY or two for a month & see how it mellows.

 

So? How'd they match up?

 

One possible, even likely, explanation is that it was a simple error. Perhaps that's the price they charge for Lagunitas's regular Pale Ale, and they hadn't entered the new one into their system yet. I've seen this sort of thing happen often before, with the proof on the receipt. As long as it isn't a mom-and-pop operation, I can accept the inadvertent largesse without losing any sleep.

 

If a limited beer will sell out at $11, it makes no sense to lower the price. As a consumer, it's a pleasant bonus, but as an economist or merchandiser, it's a misallocation.

If TW thinks it can lure a different customer base to buy this (and other) beer from them, then the promotional spend was worth it. I'm just not sure that was actually their strategy.

 

I'll preface this by saying that obviously it's not apples to apples as the Cowiche was canned on 9/20 and Born Yesterday was bottled on 10/26.

That said, to my nose and palate the two had remarkably similar aroma and flavor profiles. Born Yesterday was just a touch sharper, brighter, and more acidic with a hint more pine (which I expected as, to me, Lagunitas beers always seem to have a somewhat piney hop profile). Cowiche is already beginning to fade but still had lots of bright juicy orange. Bitterness and acidity was almost identical, as was mouthel. It was about as close as I've ever come to drinking two glasses of the same beer, but packaged about a month apart.

 

Perhaps undue credit, indeed. Perhaps broad-spectrum brand representation lowers it. I shunned the @EdwardAbbey take on it being a entry failure, but maybe they did just think it was New Dogtown. That's bad bookkeeping on a national chain's part, anyway.

Didn't last year's batch turd...in this region, last year? Once bitten? It was brewed in much more volume, this year, right? I know I'm not buying anymore, even if I find myself next to Total Wine. It was worth it, at $11 or $7.99. Just like that month-old Topcutter.

Nationally, perhaps, $7.99 seems far more ludicrous. I know living in Orlando, TW was really my only hope of good beer that wasn't a permanent keg of Jai Alai sitting in my buddy's wine bar.

 

Truly, I was only speculating. But it was actually based on my picking up a couple 6-ers of Born Yesterday at a local grocery co-op a few days ago for the same price, and definitely listed as the regular New Dogtown. It's happened before for different beers, at different places; and it's more likely to happen the sooner you go after a new beer arrives. Data entry is not always the Homo sapiens forte.

 

Do you think multiple varietals of freshies played a part in the similarity? Lagunitas claims three + on the labels, & Cowiche had two batches of two & three, right? I had the one can of Citra/Simcoe, but my memory of that one can trumps this BY, for me. Guess I prefer my single-varietal freshies, more. Fresh's Mosaics are still holding quite nicely, Simcoes in Breakside's (although their processing seemed to be more than gimmicky) & Cascades in Wanderlust & Vernside (although the malt bill really pumped that one up) were next-level good. My love of Sam Adams Deconstructed 12-pack of Latitude 48 sparked my interest in singe-hop beer & has a psychological affect, of sorts.

 

I'm a consumer and not a brewer, so any conjecture on my part would closely resemble me talking out of my ass. Standard Cowiche has Citra and Simcoe; Born Yesterday has Mosaic, Amarillo, Equinox, and other varieties. It could also be that my ability to discern differences between beers isn't all that developed, which I am totally OK with.

 

Did you happen to have last year's Born Yesterday? I know that memory is notoriously fickle, but it was, to my mind, a completely different beer. Then, I thought it was transcendent--utterly in a class of its own. This year, it's still fantastic, but "only" on the level of our best local offerings.

 

Nope. Yesterday was the first time I'd ever had it. Can't say if the beer is different from last year, but I have experienced having a beer one time and being utterly blown away and then having it again and not so much. Could be batch variation, could be psychological, could be any number of other factors. I'm grateful for the times when a beer blows my mind but have also learned never to expect to be able to repeat the experience, even with the same beer.

 

I wanted your ass-talking conjecture. That's why I asked. I'm like you, as relates to your reply, w/o the experience of NW beer beyond the scope of a year. I thought your comparison was surprising & interesting, both.

 

Yes, I'm quite familiar with this phenomenon. Sometimes, different bottles I have within the same 4 or 6-pack will taste quite dissimilar, if I consume them on different days. What's really changed more in this case: the beer, or me? However, last year's Born Yesterday was 7.5% ABV, and used a different hop bill, from what I can tell. So, it's definitely not the same as this year's. Fallible memory doesn't even enter into it, methinks. Like every newborn baby, this one is different, in some way, than all the others that came before.

 

I actually have a lot of experience with NW beer; I just don't know in great detail how they get the flavors/aromas they do.
If you are still looking for ass-talking conjecture, I kindly suggest that you follow the Republican presidential primary.